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In many of these countries, governments executed (or killed) their own citizens.
在很多这样的国家里，政府可以处决他们的子民。
This is why the men who wrote the Declaration of Independence included the right to life.
这就是撰写《独立宣言》的人将生存权纳入其中的原因。
The second of Jefferson's rights is the right to liberty (or freedom).
杰弗森写下的第二项权利是自由权。
The right to liberty is a person's right to make his or her own decisions.
自由权是人们有自由作出决定的权利。
Again, many of the countries from which the earliest Americans came did not give their people this right.
同样地，很多最早的美国人的祖国没有给予他们人民这种权利。
The rights to life and liberty are easy to understand,
生存和自由权很容易理解，
but the third right, the right to the pursuit of happiness, is more vague (or unclear and difficult to understand).
但是第三项权利，追求幸福的权利，就更含混不清了。
To pursue is to work hard to get something, in this case, happiness.
“Pursue”就是努力去获得某物，在这里某物是指“幸福”。
Happiness, of course, could mean anything a person wants to have: a job, a family, or a safe place to live.
当然，幸福可以是任何人们要想拥有的东西：工作，家庭或安全居所。
The writers of the Declaration of Independence believed that the government should not interfere with (or get in the way of) a person's right to pursue happiness.
《独立宣言》的撰写者认为政府不得干预人们追求幸福的权利。
The pursuit of happiness is exemplified by (or shown or seen in) many American rags-to-riches stories,
很多美国人白手起家的故事就是追求幸福的典范，
where a person who is very poor becomes very rich because of their own hard work, including those of several U.S. Presidents.
因为他们的努力工作，所以他们由贫变富，若干位美国总统就是这样的人。
译文为可可英语翻译，未经授权请勿转载！
